Last week of drive took us from Yellowstone National Park USA to Canadian Rockies, Western Canada took us round to many pleasant sites of waterfalls, frozen lakes, turquoise lakes, series of snow cladded mountains, glaciers and national parks with full of forests and wildlife like bears, deer and bison.
Some of the places where we enjoyed our days and nights:
Biggest Truck in the World – used for coal mining in Sparwood, Canada
Winter snow has still not melted. Snow could be traced everywhere. Some of the lakes were still found frozen
Snowy Mountains
Frozen Lakes
Oh! What a place! Yellowstone National Park.
Here is a glimpse of the wildlife we found. Bisons were in plenty.
Bison
Beautiful yellow and grey deer were also found in very close proximity. As some of the places we could walk with them
We were lucky to that suddenly a Coyote (Wolf Family) came in from front of our car (left top picture)
We could see a herd of deer passing through a pond in an absolutely disciplined way, as can be seen on picture at left bottom
Bears just on roadside welcoming us near Jasper. Bear was less than 10 Mtr from us. I was tempted to go out of the car and have a selfie!
One of the main reasons we came to Yellowstone National Park was seeing the Geysers, and they did not disappoint. The anticipation was enough. My goodness, when it erupts…
We saw many geysers. Two were prominent amongst them. One was called Old Faithful. It started with a steaming hole. There are chairs kept around it in a circle around 100 metres in radius. A computer program estimates the time of eruption, with a ten minute margin of error. Everyone sits down, and soon enough, the show begins.
Slowly, the hole begins to throw water out. It faked out three or four times, when the fountain only reached about the height of a full grown man. But then, it started, and didn’t stop. It reached a height of at 200-250 feet, spewing hot water and steam from its mouth, water flowing everywhere.
Sulphur Hot Springs
Our jet-lag had got us by the tails. We all woke up at different times. All of us woke up before 5 am. The plan was wake up at 6:30, but our bodies were still in Mumbai Time!
After breakfast and checking out, we sat in the warmth of a fire that had been set up. There is nothing quite as soothing as the warmth of a fire, the crackling sound it makes, the randomness in its designs and patterns. It really calmed us all down as we waited for a van to take us to the rent-a-car.
Ruhi and I browsed through their cars, and finally settled on a Ford Escape. Owing to its huge trunk, comfortable seats, and – most importantly – in-built navigation system, we thought it was perfect. The person at the counter happened to be from Goregaon, so we got chatting. Delightful person. He took me through it all in Gujrati, which I understand, but can’t quite speak much.
I turned and the engine purred to life. We were on our way. At around 9 a.m., we set out to White Sulphur Springs, on way to Yellowstone, USA.
The road was mostly flat. If you live in India, you have never seen this much flat land in your life. There were no mountains for miles. The ground was brownish-yellow, but I suspect that if one goes in the correct season, it would all be lush and green.
As we got closer, the view got better. The mountains started coming in, and with them, the snow. There is nothing like the feeling of snow: its shining white colour, the cold it brings along with it, the warmth you get from the inside… one can never get enough. I hadn’t expected this. By my plans, we were to come back up north via the snow, but I had not anticipated this beauty at all.
There were vast stretches of road where we were the only car on the road. No one else seemed to want to be here, and that really surprises me. It was also sort of soothing. We had a little joke in the car where we would start clapping and cheering when we saw a car.
All said and done, the car ride from Calgary to White Sulphur Springs, Montana, U.S.A. was about 10 hours. Adding to that the eleven hour layover we had at Heathrow Airport the previous day, and the two nine hour flights it took to get here, it’s safe to say we were all tired out of our minds.
The Motel we stayed at, Spa Hot Springs Motel, was special. It had three pools with pure natural sulphur spring water, each pool set to a different temperature. The lowest was 98 degrees Fahrenheit.
We got into our swimming suits and to the pools. You will never have a more soothing experience in your life. I don’t know what it is – the high temperature or the Sulphur, but my God, such a refreshing experience.
Tiredness if any vanished. It was so good, for a moment I considered changing our route so that we could come back to this place on our return route to the Canadian Rockies. Alas, that cannot be. We have better things planned for the way back. More exciting news to come!
During our driving in first half of May, the winter snow will still be there. Some lakes will still be frozen in Canadian Rockies and a few roads in Yellowstone will still be closed. But the snow all around will have its own charm and excitement. Considering these closures, I worked the route, keeping maximum time on road to be 10 hours per day.
Against the expectation of 30-45 days for Canadian visas, we got our visas in less than 2 weeks.
To ensure that the car has enough space to carry the baggage of all four of us, I selected a compact SUV after assessing its cubic feet storage capacity. I opted to hire it from an agency a few km outside the airport as it reduced my rental cost to less than half with hotel pickup facility.
Hotel bookings were done at each location, giving preference to “free cancellation” option terms. That gave me scope to change the route to certain extent while finalizing the plans.
Bags are packed and all set to go on tomorrow, the 30th April !
If you would like to receive more frequent (almost daily) updates of this trip here are the social media links: Facebook, Instagram.
Why Canadian Rockies and Yellowstone NP?
On one of my business trips to the U.S.IN 2008, a prospective customer asked me about my recent trek to the Mount Everest Basecamp. It turns out he was a regular trekker. He told me about his favourite hike-and-drive: the Canadian Rockies. That’s what created the spark to explore this Range.
Research revealed that it would be thrilling to go from Vancouver to Alaska via the Canadian Rockies. However, I had other trips lined up, so the Rockies had to wait.
In 2014, I went to Alaska. Though I wanted to drive to Alaska, I soon realised that taking a cruise to Alaska would be an equally exhilarating experience. So, we took a ship, and once more, the Rockies were put in the back seat.
After Alaska, I drove in Iceland, and completed the epic 22,000 kilometer ‘Road to London’ drive, I began to contemplate the big question: what’s next? I didn’t want to stop. This world is too beautiful to not explore! After some research, three options presented themselves: Egypt and Jordan, an African Safari, or the Canadian Rockies. Pushpa and I also desired to take some of our grandchildren on this trip.
Nishi, who was with us for the ‘Road to London’ drive, was going to begin her 5th standard in a new school. She didn’t want to miss the last few days in her current school, so she passed on this trip. Aarya is just 4, so she was out of the question. That left my other two grandchildren Arsh and Ruhi, who instantly consented to join.
I presented the options to them. Arsh was totally indifferent. Ruhi, however, was all for the Rockies, owing to the abundance of snow. She said, “I just love snow. Traveling in snow sounds really exciting to me.” The grandchildren had spoken. Rockies. Looking to their other educational commitments, early May appeared to be the only possibility.
Normal season for Rockies is July to October. May is an odd season as some of the roads would still be blocked with snow and the lakes at higher altitudes would still be in frozen state. But the month of May gives us an advantage. More of snow everywhere. Hiking and trekking on snow covered mountains, frozen lakes and river glaciers would be a real fun. Driving around these mountains during that period would be an added excitement.
Bingo! The plan was set. Pushpa, Arsh, Ruhi, and I were going drive around the Canadian Rockies. But as the title of this blog suggests, we are also going to Yellowstone National Park. Where did that come from?
Arsh and Ruhi’s educational commitments in India were very complicated. After factoring in these commitments, and the correct season, this is what we came up with: we had to start the trip on any day between the 1st and 3rd of May and continue for two weeks before returning to the motherland. For the Rockies, 8 to 10 days were adequate, but we wanted to spend the maximum of available time with the grandchildren. So, we had a few more days in hand. Hence, I decided to put in the Yellowstone National Park. That takes 7 days. We’d be done 3 or 4 days too late. I dropped Vancouver, and instead we would land in Calgary, and do a sort of circle, south into the U.S., to visit Yellowstone, and then back up north into the Rockies, making the most efficient use of our time. That was it! A drive through the Canadian Rockies and Yellowstone National Park was decided.
I will try to keep you updated on this trip. If you would like to receive more frequent (almost daily) updates here are the social media links: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram